Facebook kicks down gender walls, adds 50+ new identity options

When you’re asked to fill in your gender on most forms, you usually get two choose from one of two options: male or female. In the last few hours however the options available on Facebook expanded massively.

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In an official announcement, the social network’s Diversity team says it worked with its Network of Support, a group of leading LGBT advocacy organisations, “to offer an extensive list of gender identities that many people use to describe themselves”.

In addition to the new list of gender identities (ReadWrite puts the number at around 56), Facebook says that people who select a custom gender will now have the ability to choose the pronoun they’d like to be referred to publicly — male (he/his), female (she/her) or neutral (they/their).

The social network also gives people the option of choosing who they want to share their custom gender identity with. “We recognize that some people face challenges sharing their true gender identity with others,” the social network says, “and this setting gives people the ability to express themselves in an authentic way”.

The new gender identity options are however only available to people using Facebook in US English. It’s unclear when or if Facebook plans to expand them to other languages.